Marshfield High's football team seeks a return to prominence

Marshfield High's young football talent has grown up, and now a team of mostly juniors and seniors is looking to make a deep postseason run.

By Jay N. Miller For The Patriot Ledger

MARSHFIELD – There had been some unspoken misdeed early in the practice, for which no one would admit guilt, so after a 2 1/2-hour session, Marshfield High football coach Lou Silva had seven of his key veterans staying late.

Starting at one end zone they did ‘gassers’ every five yards, running in place until the whistle blew and they had to hit the ground.

By the time they reached the opposite end zone, one of the biggest Rams had scurried over to the fence to lose his lunch, before hurrying back to finish the drill. The rest of them were obviously exhausted, wearing looks of embarrassment as they left the field.

“I still love you,” Silva said to one of them, “but if you break the rules, you have to pay the price.”

“Right, Coach, I know” the player replied with a smile.

It’s all business at Marshfield High this August as 95 candidates from freshman on up battle for positions with the Rams. If last year’s team was a squad on the verge of getting back into contention, this 2014 edition is definitely aiming for big things.

In recent years, a Marshfield reservation for the postseason was a foregone conclusion as the Rams appeared in four consecutive EMass Super Bowls starting in 2006, finally winning one in 2009. The rebuilding year of 2010 saw them go 5-5, and then a 7-4 campaign in 2011 brought some thrills.

But the Rams became a kiddie corps in 2012, with most of their talent in the freshman and sophomore classes, and an 0-11 season was the result. Last year, those youngsters had grown a bit, and learned how to score points in bunches. That kept them in almost every game, and they showed a decent amount of clutch play, too, winning three games in the closing minute or two, and dropping only one contest that way.

But the Marshfield run in the playoffs ended early. A large measure of redemption came in the Thanksgiving Day showdown with archrival Duxbury, when the Rams rallied from an 18-6 halftime deficit to win 38-34 on a Chris Lunn touchdown with 34 seconds remaining. A 5-6 final record represented a good step forward, but this year their goals are higher.

“We won a couple close ones, and lost a couple last year,” said Silva. “This season these kids have got to learn how to finish games. We’ve got a lot of experienced juniors, who played a lot as sophomores and freshmen. It will be nice to have a team that is mostly juniors and seniors this season, instead of the underclassmen that made up most of the past couple of years’ teams.”

Junior quarterback Jack Masterson, now a strapping 6-foot-1, 190 pounds, has been one of the South Shore’s most poised signal-callers since he stepped in as a freshman. He’s entering his third year at the offensive helm and has a passel of solid weapons to call upon. The biggest one is obviously tight end Dan Dalton (6-5, 235), but Silva is confident that the Rams have enough talent for a really diversified attack.

“Danny Dalton is back and he’ll be a big factor,” said Silva. “But we also have two very good, veteran juniors on the outside in split ends Jason Darcy (6-3, 185) and Mitch Bishop (6-4, 175), and they’re going to give Jack two nice, tall targets to throw to as well. Junior Adam McNamara and Matt Armstrong will also see action at tight end.”

Junior scatback Frank Catanoso (5-8, 160) is back to lead the Rams’ running attack, but Silva hopes he’ll have plenty of help.

“We would expect Frank Catanoso to be our lead back,” said Silva, “but Chris Lunn (6-0, 185) will also get a lot of carries. And we also have Jacob Maher (6-2, 190), a senior who has played tight end and linebacker for us in previous years, and we’re trying him at running back, where he’s looked good.”

The offensive line also has a lot of returning veterans, but one big change this year is that many of them will be pressed into double duty, playing defense, too. The Rams were hit fairly hard by graduation on the defensive side, losing five key defensive backs, and most of their line. Senior Matt Benson (6-2, 220) leads a savvy bunch of ’backers, but the rest of the defense will be kind of a work in progress.

“A lot of our kids on the line will be going both ways, which they didn’t have to do last year,” Silva said. “On defense we have a solid group of linebackers, but we did lose almost our whole front line, so we’re trying to find replacements. We also lost our whole secondary to graduation – five key guys – so that’s one area we are focusing on, finding players who can perform back there.

“We’ll be doing a lot of mixing and matching in the preseason, playing a lot of kids,” Silva added. “If they get out there and show that they know what they’re doing, they’ll certainly get a shot. We have competition at a lot of positions, especially on defense, and I think that’s good.”

Finding the right people for those positions is especially crucial this season, as Marshfield opens with non-league foe BC High, then Barnstable, Dennis-Yarmouth and Bridgewater-Raynham.

“Those are our first four games, so OK, we have no time to spare,” said Silva. “Of course, the Atlantic Coast League is down to five teams now (that Plymouth North and Plymouth have relocated to the Patriot League), so it is a compressed schedule, and I’d say D-Y is the team to beat in the ACL.”

But if there will be a certain amount of change in the Rams’ starting lineup, one advantage is that Silva has a staff of veteran coaches who’ve all been with him for years.

“The most important thing about that is that we don’t have to spend any time coaching the coaches,” said Silva. “Everybody on our staff is on the same page and knows how things work here. Everyone has been here at least six years, and a couple of the guys have been with us for 20 years or more. And all our younger coaches – the guys coaching the freshmen for example – are all ex-Marshfield players. That kind of continuity is a tremendous help, building a solid Marshfield football tradition.”